Links, a Railroad MUD and Buffalo's FW Tower

You are railfan
to visit this interlocking
Last Updated Friday, 14-Nov-2003 17:10:34 EST

The Railfan.net Links Page is a gathering from
around the net. Some may be a bit obscure, but there is Railroad information of
some kind accessable through each one. This is an ongoing project and will
never end :).

If you do decide to try out our Mud, we have to warn you that our MoonMUD is
VERY Addicting and can be hazardous to your sleeping habits!

As I used to spend a lot of time at Tower FW here in Buffalo, NY I have a
soft spot for towers and interlockings. These were the places where you
could usually get the most bang for the railfanning buck (or waiting time ;)

I first stumbled upon FW Tower when I was 15 years old walking the old
NYC line from Buffalo's Exchange St. Station. I had no idea where the
tracks I was walking on went to, but I knew they went somewhere.

The Central shared some facilities in the Downtown Buffalo area with a
few different railroads and there was a myriad of connecting tracks in
this area. I knew that the Central's wye connected it to the mainline
right here, but I didn't know where the tracks that crossed two legs of
this wye led to. There was no time like the present to find out so on
that cold and drizzly spring day in 1976 I decided to follow them for a
mile or so and see if I could find out.

There was rust on the rails, but no so heavy that it appeared to be
abandoned. There had definately been a train on it sometime in the past
few weeks or months. I figured it was the old Erie Downtown line because
they led to an old freight house which had Erie markings on it, but I
wasn't sure back then.

After wandering almost a mile amongst industrial looking buildings and
weedy grass lots I crossed under the Seneca Street bridge (since removed)
and before me was a Railfan's Paradise!

This was one of the busiest looking rail intersections I had ever seen at that
point. Lines cris-crossed in all directions and fanned out to the great
beyond. In the middle of all this trackage pandemonium was an apparently
abandoned interlocking tower. I had come across many old towers in my
wanderings on the area Central and DL&W lines and had even managed to
get into a few through the courtesy of local vandals. I, being the
curious teen-aged railfan trespasser that I was, decided to hike up the
stairs and see if the door was open. I was sure it was abandoned and
had been nailed shut or locked up, but it sure couldn't hurt to look!

Boy was I surprised when not only was the door unlocked but when I opened
it and went inside there was a towerman sitting at his desk talking on
the phone, OH NO!!!!!

I hastily apologized for intruding upon his domain and begged forgiveness
explaining that I had thought it to be an abandoned building and just
wanted to see if the levers (the interlocking machine) were still in place.

To my astonishment he was more than happy to see me and was one of the
friendliest guys I have ever met on any railroad safaris. He had some
great stories and was a great teacher.

Scotty was the regular first trick operator at FW. He was more than happy to
show me the ropes and instruct me in the finer points of lining routes and
setting signals. I got to talk to the DM operator (down the PRR at their
interlocking with the DL&W City Branch) and signal maintainers. I got to know
some of the train crews and other "regulars" at FW. If it had been 50 years
earlier it would probably have become my training for working for the railroad.
Alas, in the 70's the northeastern railroads were floundering in a sea of red
ink and most of the romance of the rails had long since departed. I had to be
content with my model railroading instead.

I was always welcome at FW after that. The second time I visited Scotty asked
"You're traveling light today, eh?" I had no idea what he meant. After a few
moments of me not getting the hint he explained that I wasn't carrying any
doughnuts and coffee! You can bet I had some with me the next time!

Scotty smoked a pipe, he preferred french vanilla pipe tobacco from Bernstone's
downtown. I had already picked up the bad habit of smoking cigarettes and at
Scotty's urging I resurrected some of my grandfather's pipes and took up pipe
smoking for a while. He taught me how to properly tamp the tobacco and light
up so that the tobacco would burn without going out all the time. It almost
succeeded in getting me off of cigarettes...almost. To this day the smell of
french vanilla pipe tobacco reminds me of Scotty and FW.

I don't know why I never took a camera to FW. That's one of my biggest regrets
about the past. To this day I have found a precious few photos of FW.

To make a long story shorter, I made a great friend and got some
experience (and exercise) around a real live Armstrong interlocking tower.
I'll never forget Scotty Whitehead and FW Interlocking even if niether one
of them is around anymore...

Here's a fair map of FW tower and surrounding lines. I finally found
a decent map to work with so I could get a decently clear scan.

The Buffalo Creek connected the NYC main to the NKP, LV, SB, B&SW and BR&P
at Buffalo Jct. from the northwest. The Erie (later Erie Lackawanna) came in
from their east Buffalo Yards to get downtown, to connect to the NKP, to
access the LV passenger main, to get to the Katherine St. Yard, to get to
their one-time extensive shops at Smith St and to interchange with the BC.
The Pennsy entered from their Harrisburg line to the southeast to get to their
downtown yard and the NYC at Tower 49A. The Nickel Plate connected the Buffalo
Junction Yards from the south to the Erie, PRR and LV. This was one hopping
interlocking, even as late as the 1970's. FW interlocking disappeared during
Conrail's "Scorched Earth Purge" of 1983, but I'll always have my memories!